


Fire and the Thud

by Sheselectric



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe, Bounty Hunters, Enemies to Lovers, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Vigilantism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-17 19:01:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29476668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sheselectric/pseuds/Sheselectric
Summary: Bounty hunting for the Alliance is a hard job and there's only one thing that can make it worse—Omega's most notorious vigilante who enjoys being in Shepard's way.
Relationships: Female Shepard & Garrus Vakarian, Female Shepard/Garrus Vakarian
Comments: 16
Kudos: 67





	Fire and the Thud

**Author's Note:**

> Bioware announces the remaster and my hyper-fixation kicks back in with the full force lol. 
> 
> I've had this little idea for a while now and I finally had the time to sit down and write it. I decided to have switching POVs as I haven't really done that before so yeah. Here goes lol.

He’d always track her movements first.

Humans liked to think they were stealthy. Subtle. That their recon-teams went in and out unnoticed. Garrus didn’t know whether it was arrogance or foolishness, but he knew it would make their strike that much easier.

And the expression on her face when he took another man down was a sight to see.

“I’m sorry, Shepard,” he said with a mocking purr in his voice. “I’m sure you’ll get to them first… sometime.”

He gave her a Turian grin and her eyebrows raised slightly. He knew her enough to understand the expression and maybe it _did_ make him a cocky bastard, but he grinned wider still.

“Remains to be seen, Vakarian,” she muttered before leaving the scene, her small team following close behind. 

It’d been a thing between the two of them for quite some time now. The catch was, however, that he was here first, and Omega seemed to favor those who really knew its underbelly—all the nooks and crannies, and dirty little secrets.

Or maybe it was because they were both deadset on one-upping the other one.

To say that he didn’t mind would be an understatement. Garrus thrived on rivalry and this was the best kind he could imagine; the one that’d rid the place of all the scum.

He cleared his throat as he looked at his crew, the smile slowly dying down. “Let’s dispose of him.”

~

Shepard plopped on the couch in her apartment, quiet anger brewing inside her chest and making her skin blush crimson red. She took a deep breath.

She’d been months on Omega by then and while the butthole of the galaxy might have had its gritty charm back in the day, it’d dissipate with each passing month. The station turned out to be the worst nest of scum and villainy she’d ever seen; its regular inhabitants forced to live in the shadows while the ever-active criminal gangs wreaked havoc around the place.

And maybe if she’d been a different person, she would have appreciated what Vakarian was doing. She understood the appeal of vigilantism. She really did. It must have seemed courageous or even noble if you looked at it from the outside, but once you’d found an alternative, the big words and heroic acts soon rung hollow.

It seemed that as much as he wanted to change the place, he was feeding into what Omega stood on—chaos, destruction, and never-ending fights for power. A perfectly rotten ecosystem tucked away into a distant corner of the galaxy.

Then there was Shepard and the job she came to do. A contractor to the Alliance, but a mundane bounty hunter to just about anyone else, tasked with rounding the criminals that escaped the bounds of the civilized space and bringing them back to face justice.

The job was hard as it was but made even more grating by Garrus and his little vigilante team. Despite herself, she gave into the competition he started. There was no other way.

If she’d wanted the fugitive, she needed to be quicker, smarter, and more devoted than he was, and he was all those things packed neatly into a towering man with icy blue eyes and a shiny sniper rifle always at his hand’s reach.

A man that haunted her every waking hour and, lately, her dreams too. Not in the way she could easily accept either, but that was a whole other can of worms.

Shepard sighed and opened her omni-tool, tracking the encrypted channels in hopes of getting a new target. The assignments wouldn’t come every day, but anytime they did, the offered pay was substantial—she told herself that it was the reason she hadn’t left Omega yet.

Her wrist vibrated, a new case file popping up, and she smiled under her nose as the details started appearing before her eyes.

~

Garrus had his specialist tap into her channels the second he learned who she was.

At first, it was simply another source of information. Omega might have been full of people who deserved a bullet in their head, but his small team had to pick its targets—knowing who the Alliance wanted, made tracking people down that much easier.

It was only when Shepard wouldn’t give up after the first few times they ran into each other that it changed into something more. Something more… pressing. He would still use the information sparingly as not to arouse her suspicion, but each time he could feel himself wanting more.

He wanted to believe it was simply about the competition. He might’ve grown up to become a disgrace to everything that the Turian hierarchy stood for, but he was still a Turian—wanting to prove himself against a mighty opponent was ingrained in his very soul.

Then there was simply _her_.

How she looked, how she moved, and even how she smelled. How she’d fill any space she was in—how he’d feel his stomach stir and his mandibles tingle anytime he saw her.

He’d learned of all her little quirks; all the little expressions of disapproval and all of the patronizing gestures that she might have been unconscious of. His fascination extended beyond mere rivalry. _She_ fascinated him.

Garrus would tuck all those feelings away—store them safely deep in the back of his mind, and relive them only when he lied in his bed late at night. He'd told himself there was no harm in that.

“I have the target,” he could hear one of his men through the visor and he grinned as he cocked his gun.

He wanted to face this one before killing them. Sniping was an art and he took pride in a quiet removal of whatever criminal he targeted at the time, but some people deserved to feel the dread before he took them out. They deserved to see his face and to know that there was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide and that this terrifying, nauseating heaviness settling in the pit of their stomach was the last thing they’d ever feel.

He could see that realization in the eyes of the man as he held him down with his boot.

“Listen,” his target croaked, “we can talk this out. There’ll be credits in it for…”

His words were cut short as Garrus put a little more pressure on his neck, a whistling sound leaving the man’s throat.

“Your slaving credits? Nah, I think I’m good.”

He aimed the gun at the man’s head ready to fire, but before he could pull the trigger, he was swept from his feet and thrown at the metal wall, his back hitting it with a thundering bang.

Shepard was standing in the door, biotics swallowing her silhouette in a blueish hue before being rapidly extinguished as she took a deep breath. Garrus fell to the floor like a discarded puppet.

“I like a rough welcome, but this was a bit much,” he muttered while scrambling to his feet and the expression on her face made the mandibles pull tight to his face.

“Stop going after my targets,” she said through gritted teeth.

“Wait, you’re not here to save me?” The slaver's puzzled expression was an amusing sight. 

Shepard's biotics flared again and he was pressed to the floor cheek down, moaning in pain as she stood above him with handcuffs.

“I don’t think she is,” Garrus said and she looked at him again, visibly unamused by his words, eyebrows furrowed as if she was about to scold him.

“Vakarian,” he could hear one of his men on their secure channel. “Do you need back-up?”

He tapped the side of his visor two times to signal that he didn’t and the connection went silent. Under any other circumstances, he’d already have his team in here, fending off whoever tried to go after his target, but it was Shepard and he appreciated the surprise.

After all, those were the rules of the game and he failed by not preparing for this eventuality. To his defense, he thought she’d get the slaver once he returned home.

Once she had the slaver secured, she approached Garrus, the strange, earthy scent of her making his heart beat faster.

“If you try to interfere one more time,” she said in a low, firm voice, “you’ll be in his place.”

Garrus knew what the words meant—he could feel the thinly-veiled threat. He knew that she’d deliver on it too because all it took for anyone was one push too hard and they’d cross any line they’d previously drawn.

Maybe if it was anyone else, he’d feel riled up by the words, but it was Shepard. Shepard who stood in front of him with fire in her eyes, her skin flushed red, and her chest moving as if there was a weight put on it, and he couldn’t take her threat as intended.

Because if it came down to it—if they really were to fight—he’d be thrilled. He could almost feel himself being pressed to the cold floor with her on top of him, her warm body straddling his as they fought, and the heavy tension in his groins made him take a step back from her.

“I can’t promise that,” he said but his usual snark was gone.

Garrus swallowed hard as he looked at her, her gaze relentless in how she studied him. And then she grabbed her slaver and left as if she’d never been in the room at all.

He _really_ needed a drink.

~

Shepard wasn’t a big drinker.

She was spending way too much time alone and drinking when you only had yourself to entertain took down one too many good men. Besides, liquor on Omega was hard to swallow even on the best day.

Yet there she was, sat in the darkest corner of the Afterlife’s bar with a foggy glass of whisky, and breaking all of her rules.

It was a celebratory drink.

Maybe one-upping Vakarian wasn’t enough of a reason to celebrate any other time, but the expression on his face when she took the target from under him earlier that day put her in just the right mood.

He was a bastard—always in her way and always with that grin on his face—and she showed him his place. Shepard gulped the whisky down, her throat burning as if set aflame, and waved at the bartender to order another one.

The alcohol was already settling in, her muscles relaxing in the accompaniment of a pleasant buzz in her head, and she smiled under her nose.

Another glass was slid in her direction and she took a small sip, enjoying the music that’d normally grate on her nerves. It seemed though that something else would anyway because she saw Garrus entering the club. He was alone but still armed to the teeth, and she wondered if he had a score to settle—if he did, she hoped his target would give him hell.

Instead of doing what she quietly expected he would, Garrus waved at the bartender as he leaned on the counter. Shepard realized that she’d never see him in a casual situation before and the sight fascinated her. She shouldn’t have felt like that, not with how much trouble he’d caused her, but her eyes were darting to him time and again, taking in all the things she’d never dwelled on before.

He was smiling as he chattered with the bartender—a gentle, friendly kind of smile that he'd never aimed at her—and it irked her for reasons she couldn’t explain. And then she noticed that she wasn’t the only one looking at him with such burning interest.

Garrus was the center of attention for the women around the bar, quick looks and shy chuckles being thrown time and again without him noticing. She didn’t know whether he avoided the attention or if he was oblivious to it, but the realization that she was as charmed by him as at least ten different girls in his vicinity made her turn the gaze away and focus on her drink.

She managed but a sip before he approached her. Maybe he wasn’t oblivious then—maybe he was just very good at picking his _targets_.

“If you want to talk with me, Shepard,” he drawled, “I’m all yours.”

It was a joke, of course—teasing in the likes of what he’d always throw her way. The alcohol must have done its job though, or that’s what she wanted to believe because the way the words rolled off his tongue made her breath hitch.

She collected herself quickly.

“I don’t,” she said and he laughed quietly, the sound strangely low and pleasant.

“Well, let me buy you a drink at least.” Shepard looked at him in surprise, her expression probably as crude as could be, because he laughed again before leaning in her direction. “C’mon. I think I owe you for today.”

She swallowed the rest of her whisky down and put the glass down with a clink.

“Fine.”

She didn’t know why she agreed because his presence should've been the last thing she’d want, but there was something about him at that moment that she simply couldn’t refuse. Maybe it was curiosity or maybe something different. Something deeper. Heavier. Something that made heat rise on her cheeks as she looked at him.

He cleared his throat and ordered two glasses, passing one in her direction when they came.

“I’m sorry about your bounties,” he said before taking a sip.

She took a sip too. “Are you?”

His eyes lit up with something mischievous and his mandibles clicked. “Not really,” he said and she couldn’t help but chuckle at his nerve. “But I know I’m a major pain in the ass for you.”

“That you are.”

To her surprise, Garrus wasn’t half as bad as she painted him to be. He was full of himself, sure. Idealistic. Stubborn. But he was also hilarious and charming, and she found herself drawn to him harder than ever before, her body leaning in his direction as they conversed over their glasses.

When she looked at his face and into his eyes, she wanted nothing more than to grab him and pull him to her lips as she’d done countless times before in her dreams. Dreams that she tried to forget as soon as she woke up, sweaty and hot, and utterly convinced that it should never happen. _It could though_ , her tipsy mind was telling her. She could pretend she didn’t hear him and force him to move closer, and then…

“I think that’s enough for me,” he said and cleared his throat. “I, uh, have some calibrations to do tonight.”

Shepard snapped out of her dreamy haze, nodding her head in agreement. She wasn’t drunk but maybe the drinks she’d had still pushed her boundaries a little bit too far.

“Me too,” she said with conviction while gathering herself to stand up. “It was… good to talk.”

Garrus looked at her as if unsure what to say, or maybe _if_ to say something at all, but as she brushed past him to end their evening without awkwardness, he found his voice.

“Do you want me to walk you home?”

She stopped and turned to look at him, her eyebrow raised.

“Walk me home?”

He sighed and raised his hands. 

“I know you can handle yourself, Shepard. But we’ve had a few drinks and this is Omega, so…”

“I’d like that,” she said because she _did_ want him to walk her home. She just didn’t want to show him how much.

~

The streets were far from calm, but after so long on Omega, everything around him was simply background noise.

The noises, and smells, and tacky neons that they passed on their way to her apartment wouldn’t bother him any other day, but especially not with Shepard at his side. She didn’t speak much as they walked and it was probably for the best because he doubted that he would manage to keep his usual façade up anyway.

You didn’t walk someone home unless you expected the evening to end in a particular way. He knew that and he knew that _she_ knew that. Yet, he was still telling himself that it was simply a nice thing to do—Garrus might have been many things, but he was always courteous towards women, and he forced himself to believe that this was the case. A courtesy.

For as cocky as he might have appeared to others, he was never good at getting down to it.

“So, this is it,” she said as they stood in front of the door to one of the nicer—for Omega’s standards anyway—buildings. “I’m sorry that I dragged you all the way here.”

He let out a small laugh, the corners of her lips rising in response.

“Well, I insisted on dragging myself here.”

“You did,” she said and he could feel the tension rising in the air, prickles of familiar electricity running up and down his spine. “I should probably…,” she started and stopped abruptly, blush rising on her cheeks as she looked at him. “Damn it,” she muttered instead and grabbed onto the collar of his armor, pressing her lips to his mouth-plates.

Garrus had kissed many women. He couldn’t complain about any of them because it was always good, but it was never like _this._

He’d never experienced the ferocity that Shepard kissed him with. Her need seemed to emanate from their joined lips and travel down his body, and the heat followed soon after, making him pant as he felt his plates shifting.

It’d be too late to stop himself even if he’d truly wanted to, but he didn’t. What he did want was to take her there and then, with strangers watching if it came down to it. 

Garrus grabbed her waist and pushed her against the door, her firm body flushed against him just as he'd imagined countless times before, and he ground between her legs with a desperate need. The moan that left her lips seemed to rung in his ears forever, making him twitch in his suit.

He took a step back almost in instinct, fearing that he would truly go too far if he didn’t control himself, and then he looked at her. The dim, red light that shined from overhead was illuminating her in a way that made her look like his very own nemesis—seductive, dangerous, and willing to do anything to get where she wanted to be.

It was a losing fight.

He clung to her again, hands traveling to her hips and he allowed her to kiss him. Her lips were warm and needy, and she slid his tongue into his mouth, tasting like something he could never get enough of.

Before he could return the kiss, she opened the door and dragged him inside. The apartment smelled exactly like her and his senses went haywire, the feverish desire resting heavily in the pit of his stomach.

Garrus grabbed on the fabric of her suit, forcing it down to her waist and she all but shivered in response, the goosebumps rising on her exposed skin. He wanted to feel them under his tongue—he wanted to drag it down her body and between her legs. He wanted to spread her open and lap on her until she came from this alone.

Instead, Shepard pressed her body into his, kissing his mandible as she nudged him in the direction of the bedroom.

The bed was bathed in the reddish light finding its way through the half-closed shutters, and he craved to lay her down and watch her undress. So, he pushed her on the mattress, enjoying how she smiled when her body landed on the soft sheets. But instead of undressing, she spread her legs invitingly, the scent of her arousal hitting his nostrils and forcing a low groan out of his lips.

“Come here,” she said in a raspy voice, and he unclasped the hard parts of his suit before joining her.

The second he lied down, she was on top of him, grabbing his wrists and pressing them into the mattress. He didn’t know whether she understood what she had done or not, but it didn’t matter, because he was too far gone now to do things differently.

He drove his talons into her hips and turned them around, nestling between her legs as she breathed heavily underneath, heart beating so hard that he could feel it in his own chest. And then he ground his hips into her core, a small moan escaping her lips.

Garrus did it again, and again, knowing how wet and desperate that'd make her, and then he slid the suit along with the underwear down her legs. He towered over her, taking in her hazy gaze, and the hardness he felt in his suit was pulsing and begging to be released.

He removed his clothes, enjoying how her eyes traveled from his face down to his thighs, and just as she was about to lift herself from the mattress, he caught her ankle and turned her on her stomach.

And then he was on top of her, teasing at her entrance, forcing her to grasp onto sheets and whimper in need. He was cocky—as cocky as when they were just two strangers bound together by the jobs they did. Garrus knew there was no going back to that now.

He sunk into her, shivering as she stretched around him, the noises she made getting louder and more desperate with every inch. The feeling of her was what he’d craved since they first met and the reality was far more overwhelming than anything he could come up with in the privacy of his own bed.

He slid one of his arms under her body, pulling her closer and holding onto her tighter as he started thrusting in deep, making her grunt with every move. Maybe it was the wait or maybe he simply wanted it too much, but the tension in his groins started to build faster than he expected, his muscles tensing and breath becoming ragged as he slammed into her time and again.

The feeling of it all was almost narcotic; as if someone blew red sand in his face and let him loose. And even though he had her—had her withering under him, moaning and pressing her hips into his—he wanted more. He wanted to feel her body twitch and crash as she was coming around him.

Garrus slid out, turning her over on her back, and the look in her eyes was threatening to undo him. She grabbed his arm, nails cutting into his skin, and pulled him to her face, her tongue darting out to lick his mouth-plate and then his mandible until it rested on his neck. She bit him, the action making his hips jerk involuntarily and he was burying himself inside her again.

This time he knew he’d not last long. He was giving her slow, deep strokes—slow enough to have her thighs tremble as she wrapped her legs around him and slow enough to only hear the stifled moans coming from her lips. They were fueling him; making his muscles strain as he could feel the release coming. In the end, it was her orgasm that did it. The feeling of it—of how her body tensed only to tighten around him—tipped him over the edge, making him finish with a raspy hiss, as his body relaxed into hers.

Shepard gently tapped on his arm and he rolled over, allowing her to take a deep breath. They lied in silence for a few seconds, him watching the ceiling, and her closing her eyes and thinking of something he’d probably be never privy to.

“I didn’t think that we’d ever…,” she muttered finally.

“I know.”

Garrus expected awkwardness. After all, he wasn’t just any man she’d picked at the bar—he was _the_ man who was in her business for months now and once the tension was finally lifted, he thought she’d tell him to grab his things and go. That’s what should’ve happened to his mind at least, but it didn’t.

She sat on the edge of the bed, stretching her back before standing up.

“Do you want something to eat? There’s that little bar on the corner here and…”

“Sure,” he said quickly.

Shepard raised her eyebrow and then erupted into a quiet laugh. “I just need to take a shower first.”

As the bathroom door closed behind her, he rested his head on the pillow that smelled perfectly liked her, and allowed himself to smile.

**Author's Note:**

> I loved writing that, but I'm also too unreliable to do multi-chapters, so I'm basically always looking for prompts/inspo for more Shakarian goodness. If you have any ideas (or just anything you'd like to see from me), toss them my way. I'll credit you if I choose to write them!


End file.
